3 Kearney Village

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Long single storey vernacular house of probable mid 19th century construction, with small projecting gabled extension to rear. The building is situated on the NE side of Kearney Village.

The front (SE) facade is asymmetrical. To the right is a timber stable door, with three unevenly spaced sash windows to the left and a single similar window to right.

The SW elevation has a window, as before, to left of gable of main house with side of (flush) gabled extension blank.

The NE gable is blank, but with central (projecting) external chimney breast.

The rear a has glazed back door and window as before both within small timber conservatory, with two windows to right and one to left as before, with two similar windows to gable of the return.

Entire house finished in rough cast render. The gabled roof is covered with Bangor blue slates and stone parapets and has three rendered chimney stacks. Cast iron gutters and down spouts. Low rendered wall around front garden.

Historical information

A building matching the size and positioning of the present house is shown on the OS map of 1860, which probably corresponds to the structure we see today. A long building is shown in roughly the same position on the OS map of 1834, but its orientation is marginally different, suggesting the that the house was built some time between 1834 and 1860.

The extension to the rear was originally built [?c.1960] as a garage.

KEARNEY VILLAGE
In early medieval times, the townland of Kearney was a possession of the McKearneys, a family possibly distantly related to the O’Neills of Tyrone. During the later medieval period this land came into the possession of the Gaelicised Norman family of the Savages, who appear to have leased much of it to the Smiths, a dependent family of similar origin. A lease from Patrick Savage to Patrick Smith from 1643 mentions what was then one of the most lucrative aspects of Kearney, ‘the mill, mill ponds and watercourses’, from which the landlord received at not inconsiderable income.

By the later 17th century the Savages had leased much of Kearney to the Ross family (of Rosstrevor) who continued in possession of the lands throughout the 18th century. It is from a lease of March 1729 that we have the first indication of a substantial settlement on the site of the present village. This settlement was to grow throughout the remainder of the century, with locals employed on the local farms and the two nearby flax and corn mills, whilst supplementing their incomes by salvaging the not infrequent shipwrecks, and perhaps smuggling. Wrecking may have taken place also.

The village probably reached its greatest extent in terms of population and activity in the 1830s, when there were 33 families, two schools (one C of I and Catholic, the other Presbyterian), and a ‘ceilidh house’. Most of the buildings we see today appear to have been present at this time, but as most were exempt from rating, very little is recorded of the village in the 1836 valuation in terms of house dimensions and occupiers*. The only dwellings which are mentioned are three single storey houses, occupied by Hugh and John McNabb and Widow Hasty (who owned the close by windmill).

The slow decline in Kearney’s fortunes began in the latter half of the nineteenth century and by 1900 the population had halved, many seeking more prosperous lives in the towns, or emigrating. By 1938 most of the Kearney farms and cottages had passed into the possession of Hugh Orr, who had established a model farm close by. The decline continued unabated, however, so that by 1945 only three houses were occupied by a total of seven residents. When the National Trust acquired the village twenty years later (with money collected during the Enterprise Neptune campaign), it was practically a ghost town.

Since 1965, the Trust have attempted to restore and reconstruct Kearney based on the plan of the village as shown on the 1834 OS Map, when the settlement had probably reached its zenith. Most of the houses are now occupied as full time homes once more, with a few as holiday residences, with all properties leased from the Trust.

Currently only one of the original dwellings lies vacant awaiting imminent restoration.

*The second valuation poses similar problems for the buildings in the village are not individually numbered on the valuation map, thus making it very difficult (if not impossible) to put the name of an occupant to a dwelling.

References- Primary sources
1 PRONI D.552 Savage/Nugent Papers
2 PRONI OS/6/3/32/1 Ordnance Survey Maps, 1st ed., 1834, Down sheet 32
3 PRONI VAL/1B/38 First valuation, Parish of Ballytrustan, 1836
4 PRONI OS/6/3/32/2 Ordnance Survey Maps, 1st rev., 1860, Down sheet 32
5 PRONI Second valuation, Parish of Ballytrustan, 1861 (in print)
6 PRONI OS/6/3/32/3 Ordnance Survey maps, 2nd ed., 1899-1900, Down sheet 32
7 Admiralty Chart of Strangford Lough, surveyed by Richard Hoskyn Master R.N. 1859-60, with small corrections 1918-38 (HMSO)

Secondary sources
1 The above history was mainly compiled from various articles kindly supplied to the authors by the National Trust, in particular one by Mrs. M.A.K. Garner, charting the early history of Kearney
2 Jim Blaney, "Mary Ann Donnan of Kearney" in 'Journal of the Upper Ards Historical Society No.3' (1979), pp.24-5
3 Reta Lyttle, "Kearney" in 'Journal of the Upper Ards Historical Society No.4' (1980), p.15

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

Long single storey vernacular house of probable mid 19th century construction, with small projecting gabled extension to rear.